I'm not sure what you mean about no grub files around... the HD is NTFS. But should I just *make* some file for grub to access? If so, where should I put it? I think I understand how to build it, but I don't know where it should go.

I needed at one point to remove Grub from a MBR. What I did after trying various other stuff unsuccessfully was using MBRWork as found on UBCD; running the option "install standard MBR code". I can't guarantee this will work and you should probably back up your existing MBR first. But it worked for me.